Son of Nigel

Things to do with Alisdair (Wig), son of Nigel. Lord of Nothing.

[sonofnigel-blog]

The final update

So at 10:30 on hand in day, I’m running down to ATF to get my finished board. Its printed so well I can’t even tell thats it screen printed. 

Ken and Joel had made 5 boards in total and were about to start making stickers and t shirts. Which was a really pleasant surprise, however useless as I can’t hand any of it in, but its nice to know they are keen to treat this as more than just a mock brief and like it enough to try it out as an actual board design. 

If only they had made the stuff earlier and I could have handed it in. 

All good though, I fulfilled the brief and are ready to hand in the board. 

May god have mercy on my soul.

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Desert and exhibition

You may notice a small disparity between the image on the left and the same image as a print on the right. This is well understood and intact took 5 attempts to get where it is now.

However I think it looks really striking, I made it because I thought it would look good on a wall, in this case my exhibition wall. I also enjoyed drawing cacti. 

Again I think the balance of texture is right here. I put the lightest of grains on the orange background with a slight fade over the top to just balance the image out. 

I then had to balance out my display colour wise. I didn't realise until I put it up just how colourful my work has become. Had you have asked me a year ago what my work would look like in a year black and white would have been my answer. 

I know I keep saying it but I’m really proud to stand and look at what I’ve done.

You can also now visit my fully fledged website:

sonofnigel.com   

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1 day, 1 drawing, 1 print!

The whole process, as literal as it happened.

So I wanted to make another print, nice and simple. I thought “I like space and astronauts, i’ll draw some astronauts floating in space.” So I did one drawing, scanned it, coloured it, added two brush mark textures that look really good, printed it, then sat down.  

Oh and there is another texture in the background, very subtle. 

It looks good and looks real children book illustration esq, something I never thought I’d do. However I think its good enough I would put it on my wall at home.

I should never spend to long on things, they always come out better, if i think less and work more.

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Devil Buttons!

Bit of fun and nice little extra 1 day project. I wanted some stuff to sell, so i designed and ordered these guys in a day. It’s a sort of salute to my time making ‘kings of hell’ but without all the over thinking and ridiculous work load. But again it was also for fun. 

I must stress the fun.

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A very Red Wedding

I’m sick to death of looking at it but its finally here. 

All the main characters are in the middle of the page, then the rest is all just madness. I think if I dont put the gold touches in it would be too much red.

Overall I’m happy with it, but I think my editorial work is more effective and its far more visually exciting and furthermore they only took a fraction of the time compared to this.

I didn't use textures on this either, not for lack of trying, but it just became to confusing with all the lines and the red as well. I’ve got to try and strike a balance again. 

Still a lot to learn. 

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Development

My game of Thrones stuff is almost there, I’ve altered my layout a touch to make it tighter and I got rid of the tables. I’m also going to explain the scene by making the scene really Red. 

I want it too look like a mix of Cleon Peterson brutality and Renaissance painting style layout.

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Editorials

literally ploughed through some editorials. I think I spent 2 days on each. But its easily the best work I’ve done so far. I think the works look a little bit rubbish  in-situ, because its a web article and not in a magazine, so the page layout didn't really lend itself, but I put the VR Panic one in just for some context.

The top image is Gary Gygax (creator of D&D) rising up above a dungeons and dragons book/codex. The article was called; Rise of the Dungeon Master and was about a book coming out about the late Gary Gygax. I’ve pretty much tried to illustrate the title of the Article, as I think it sets the tone really well. I’ve literally made a floating dungeon master. I’m really happy with the colours and the textures on this one. Only one texture is used on the back ground but it really helps the image levitate off the page. The white outline round the armour works really effectively as well, giving Gary an almost ethereal quality. ‘VR Panic’ is perhaps more complicated in layout and took a touch longer, but far simpler in terms of colour. It might be a bit cliche but I really wanted to separate the VR guy from the hysterical people and also imply and calm with him. He’s relaxed and standing alone amidst the panicking public, unaware that the news stand behind him points a sign saying “media frenzy” directly at him.

Stoked.  

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My big influences 

New illustration style is down to a lot if internal factors but its also of course drawn from other artists and media as well. 

The three big contributors have been the often brutal and hyper masculine Cleon Peterson. Showing often the worst sides of humanity in an almost greek  style. He’s recently been considered high art, though his roots are very visibly still in illustration. My Game of thrones work will owe a lot to his layouts and human forms.

In the middle is stills from the beautiful animated series ‘Samurai Jack’. Its been a huge influence on my understanding of colour and texture. Its also the raddest story has really pushed what cartoons can be in terms of genre.

Last but not least is Ben Javens, former BCU student (when it was UCE). Mr Javens has constantly made me smile with his work, his muted pallets and simple lines perfectly balance out on a page. Compositions are always just the right amount of everything, and his lines are descriptive without being too detailed. Something I need to take a few notes from probably. 

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First blood

So these are my ‘Hardhome’ images. Its not the massive battle I wanted to do, but I think my Red Wedding image is going to do that for me. I’m not sure the portrait works textures wise, but it was a good experiment to see if I could make characters recognisable in my style. I think I still need to tone down the textures. 

Also the proportions of feet and arms aren;t quite right yet. My muscle dudes were perhaps to beefy these guys are too skinny. 

Still like them though.

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Layouts

These are just rough layouts of my thumbnails. I’m really unsure about the top 2 for hardhome. I’m scared i’m biting off a bit more than I can chew, I want them to look busy and be well populated. I also think they’re a little over worked.

The bottom left though looks about right. I just gotta draw some lots for that one. Not sure if the tables will stay in though. 

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Score!

They choose this one, god knows how I’m going to get £100 off em, or the Tshirt they promised, but i’m very happy. 250 will be made and given away to people who purchase VIP tickets. 

This is just a mock up, but i’m pleased as punch. Son Of Nigel has been more successful than Alisdair Smith by a mile.

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Not Game of Thrones

So again i’ve been distracted by another side project but this one has the incentive of a £100, which is better than a kick in the teeth. 

Got a decent amount of sketchbook work that goes with this. It was preferable to the client that it was in 1 colour because its to go on a T-shirt. these are my final designs that I’ve sent in. You’ll note i’ve slipped the little dinosaur “treezilla” into every image. He was the only real stipulation of the brief. I’ve made him far more playful than the fire breathing version someone else had done before.

We’ll see how it goes. 

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Genesis

A big change of tac in my work. Started work on a project illustrating various Game of Thrones scenes from the TV show. Fun. 

The big thing is that I’m working in colour, quickly and in a pretty bold style. 

Its very exciting and there is a lot influencing this move.

I’m also branding myself Son Of Nigel.

Much like being entered in to a witness protection program, the name change is a chance to absolve past sins and start afresh. 

Hold tight. 

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Kings Of Hell

So I’m skipping to the end here. The development of this project is locked away safely in my sketchbook. Here is the finished article. 

I put everything together and did the page layouts including the boarders and the front and back cover. My collaborator on this project Lee Spark (aka Eel Skraps) really worked hard to make sure he got his illustrations done and the hard work really shows. Lee works really well in black and white, with just pure pen illustrations, however my drawings felt a bit weak next to Lee’s without colour. So colour them I did. 

Unfortunately I dislike nearly every illustration I’ve done. A plus side though is in the process of making these, I’ve learnt a lot about using photoshop in terms of colour. This is in large part to me regularly not using colour in anything. In this regard I’m pretty proud. I think I might be able to more confidently use colour now.

However the whole time I was making it, I kept thinking how much I wanted to work on anything but this and find a way to simplify my work. I’m not Lee, I can't draw as technically as him. So why try, surely my illustrative salvation is in simpler aesthetics.  

I think this is one of the projects that has given me a big kick up the arse in regards to how I make work. Though i don’t like the work I made, the end result is what we set out for. However several weeks for essentially me to draw and colour 5 pieces is mental. 

I did this project so I could indulge in more fun traditional hand drawn illustration (with some wilder, less serious themes), instead of my more usual more serious photo collage stuff. However it wasn't the experience I wanted. 

It has made me really consider my skill set and what I want my brand of illustration to be. Because what is it? 

Lee is happy with the Kings of Hell zine, thus I am. 

Now to go away and really figure out what to do next....

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Made

So I made it and honestly it didn’t go to plan at all. So heres the breakdown.

I wanted to print the zine black with green touches. The black had be taken away (possibly indefinitely), and the green was out of ink. Amazing start.

So I grabbed Orange and Red and just got on with it. 

The paper is newsprint, which I really like. I think the paper helps absorb the ink better and also the colour is more subtle than the brilliant white of some papers.

I didn't staple it. I made 2 and didn't staple it. I did this because mainly I think its not worth it. Its folded and you get the idea, its not for an audience. 

This project was more a gateway drug to making more and better work.

It got me going, its made, time to get on better things.

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Pages

I’ve been making everything in a limited colour palette because ultimately its going to end being made through the riso. I’m testing a green in there (the pink is a mistake). Black and white is my favourite colour though, its the best.

The 3rd down on the right is my absolute favourite spread. It has no illustration, instead just 3 photos and a line of text. The background photo nicely breaks it into 2 pages, and then the 2 photos are upside down. 

just gotta test this zine out on a regular printer, to make sure the pages print in the right order, then I can more confidently print it on the riso. 

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Theme

Needed a theme and I found one. The photo I took of the word machine made me think, why not use the wiki page for the word machine, to pick out some ambiguous sounding text. 

I can mix some text in with my images and then naturally semiotics will do the rest. Soon as word is next to an image its unavoidable that the viewer will try to assemble a reason for the association.

It’ll give the work some continuity and weight, if only in a very loose and flimsy way.